Adelaide CDB Pt. II

I thought for a long time, while putting the trip together, about whether I should include Adelaide. I decided to do it, because in the end you can only form an opinion on the ground. And I really wanted to understand why this city ranks so highly in so many lists of the most liveable places. And what can I say: at first glance, I didn’t get it. To be fair, it rained most of the time, and I walked around the city with an umbrella, in pleasant temperatures but unpleasant humidity.

The visit to the natural history museum alone made the trip worthwhile. I also made it into the Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA) very early on Sunday morning at 10 a.m., and, as usual, the entry was free again. The installations and paintings were well done and definitely worth seeing. What stuck with me most was Jake and Dinos Chapman’s “Das swings unt roundabouts fur der kinder? Ja? Nein! Schweinhund! (Swings and roundabouts for the children? Yes? No! Pigface!)”. Holy shit, that was truly striking. In short: an apocalyptic diorama scene in which childhood idyll, a playground, collides with extreme violence, disgust, and destruction. The McDonald’s figures appear as gaudy, “psychotic” mascots for consumption, excess, and the destructive logic of capitalism. Figures in Nazi uniforms point to barbarism and industrialised violence. “Absence Embodied” was another piece you don’t just hang in your living room: a three-dimensional red-thread sculpture, 200 km of thread. Very impressive.

Which is more than I can say about Adelaide as a city, at least for me. Comparing it to Sydney, Melbourne, or even Brisbane doesn’t really work. Adelaide feels about twenty years behind. Sure, there is a public transport system that you can even use for free within the CBD. But compared to many other cities around the world, it feels like it was built because a big city simply has to have something like that. Efficiency and functionality? I’m not sure. A small example: to get to the airport, you have to take a bus. That pretty much says it all.

Otherwise, too: along the North Terrace axis you find most of what feels “modern”, the station, the hospital, the gallery, the museum, and, very importantly, the university, plus several new buildings. But beyond that? Three- to four-storey buildings with the typical Australian flat roofs and balconies, not really old, but not really modern either. Walking through the CBD with my umbrella in hand, very little impressed me. Nothing particularly beautiful, nothing truly outstanding.

Adelaide was planned and built less than 200 years ago, with a grid-like street layout, between the coast and the hills. It was not a convict colony, and they are proud of that. I skipped the Migration Museum and the Adelaide Gaol, maybe a mistake. But this “White Australia” attitude already disgusted me in Melbourne, how should I put it, it really put me off. Especially because, even if it’s less obvious now, it seems that not much has changed in many people’s heads.

The current immigration system, well. I don’t need to look at an exhibition about it, I’m living it. And honestly, I don’t like a lot of it. Second-class human. At the same time, it helps me understand what immigrants experience in Germany. At least I have the same skin colour. People only turn away and leave you standing mid-sentence once I open my mouth and they realise I’m not “one of them”. Others don’t even have the luck of being addressed or noticed in the first place. That’s just how it is here, and it helps me understand things better.

Pretty disappointed and bored with Adelaide, the rain, and my broken umbrella, I eventually retreated to my room. Before that, I saw a demonstration by Iranians in exile, which was later shown again on TV.

People had suggested Hahndorf to me: I absolutely had to visit if I was already in Adelaide. It was supposed to be “so nicely German”. I looked at pictures, thought about it, and decided I didn’t need to take travel tips from someone who has never set foot off their continent in their life. Really not. I know the original, and all its specialities. Germany is not half-timbered houses with flat roofs and leafy trees, with brass bands and lederhosen.

And: is there nothing positive from Adelaide, only boredom and monotony? No, there is something. On a second look, one thing stood out. The people are remarkably friendly. They talk to you. They don’t turn away when they realise you’re not from here. They say “my love” or “dear” when you order coffee, they smile, ask whether it has started raining again. Small talk. For me, in Australia, that’s rather unusual. That’s what I’m taking away from Adelaide: friendly people.

“Whether I was here because of the festivals,” someone asked me. Two festivals were happening in the city, presumably to boost tourism. To be honest, I couldn’t really see much of it. The crowds of people rushing through Melbourne, Sydney, or Brisbane with a camera in hand are almost completely absent in Adelaide. Why would they come? Why would anyone come here? Because you get served a coffee with a smile? You can get that elsewhere in the world too.

So what’s next, Perth? People from Perth tell me it’s supposed to be amazing. Everyone else tends to smile rather dismissively at the city. For me, it’s back to Brisbane for now. I still haven’t really engaged with the cultural side there, the museums and galleries, in any serious way. Sure, I’ve been to an exhibition here and there, but not for long and not in depth. I should do that before I make my final judgement.

In that spirit.